What: Charlotte Hornets vs Miami Heat

When: 7:30pm Eastern

Where: Spectrum Center; Charlotte, NC

How to watch: Prime Video

Outfitting: Hornets–Association (white), Heat–Icon (black)

Game Lines: Hornets -5.5, Hornets money line -218, O/U 228.5

Injuries:
Hornets: None

Heat: Pelle Larsson-questionable (leg), Nikola Jovic-out (ankle), Dru Smith-out (foot)

We’re here. After a down then up season, the Hornets have secured the 9 seed in the play-in tournament. The story of their season is exactly what the play-in tournament was supposed to reward. They’ve been a better team than their full season record suggests. They were simply plagued by injuries to start the season. They have an avenue to make the playoffs where they’d be on the outside looking in in years past. And of course, the opponent is the Heat. It couldn’t be anyone else.

There are two ways to look at this game. The optimist will tell you that the Heat are vulnerable. They won their last two games of the season, one against the tanking Wizards and one against a Hawks team resting their key players. But prior to that, they had lost nine of their previous 12 games. That includes getting 30 pieced by the Hornets back near the beginning of that slide. They’ve had one of the worst defenses in the NBA during that closing stretch.

On the other hand, the pessimist will tell you that it’s the Miami Heat. The Heat always seem to get the better of the Hornets in these situations, including knocking the Hornets out of their last playoff appearance ten years ago. The Heat are led by a championship winning coach and a lof ot their key players are playoff tested and battle hardened. The Hornets have struggled in some high pressure games late in the season. You wouldn’t expect the Heat to do the same.

The Heat might look a little different than what we’ve seen in the other meetings between these two teams. For one, they’re healthy. And Erik Spoelstra has tinkered with the lineup to find some balance. In the season finale, he started Bam Adebayo and Kel’el Ware together with Davion Mithcell, Tyler Herro, and Andrew Wiggins in the back court. All star Norman Powell came off the bench, and he and Jaime Jaquez both dropped over 20 points. That’ll put some pressure on Coby White to help the Hornets bench keep pace when the lineups are broken.

The Hornets are going to need to find their shot to win this game. The Heat have thrown zone defenses at them in the past to slow up the offense and deter drives, and it’s generally worked. The Hornets can blow up that plan by shooting over the top of the zone, but they also need to stay insistent on getting into the paint. We’ve seen them become somewhat passive when the games have gotten intense and settle for jumpers. The Heat haven’t defended well. The Hornets need to take advantage.

It’s going to be the most stressful viewing experience Hornets fans have had in a long time. Hopefully it at least goes better than the last two play-in appearances. It certainly can’t get much worse, right?